[ebooks] A Brief History of the Artist from God to Picasso by Paul Barolsky at Arts-Photography

Description

From one of the most interesting and iconic musicians of our time; a piercingly tender; funny; and harrowing account of the path from suburban poverty and alienation to a life of beauty; squalor; and unlikely success out of the NYC club scene of the late 80s and 90s.There were many reasons Moby was never going to make it as a DJ and musician in the New York club scene. This was the New York of Palladium; of Mars; Limelight; and Twilo; of unchecked; drug-fueled hedonism in pumping clubs where dance music was still largely underground; popular chiefly among working-class African Americans and Latinos. And then there was Mobymdash;not just a poor; skinny white kid from Connecticut; but a devout Christian; a vegan; and a teetotaler. He would learn what it was to be spat on; to live on almost nothing. But it was perhaps the last good time for an artist to live on nothing in New York City: the age of AIDS and crack but also of a defiantly festive cultural underworld. Not without drama; he found his way. But success was not uncomplicated; it led to wretched; if in hindsight sometimes hilarious; excess and proved all too fleeting. And so by the end of the decade; Moby contemplated an end in his career and elsewhere in his life; and put that emotion into what he assumed would be his swan song; his good-bye to all that; the album that would in fact be the beginning of an astonishing new phase: the multimillion-selling Play. At once bighearted and remorseless in its excavation of a lost world; Porcelain is both a chronicle of a city and a time and a deeply intimate exploration of finding onersquo;s place during the most gloriously anxious period in life; when yoursquo;re on your own; betting on yourself; but have no idea how the story ends; and so you live with the honest dread that yoursquo;re one false step from being thrown out on your face. Mobyrsquo;s voice resonates with honesty; wit; and; above all; an unshakable passion for his music that steered him through some very rough seas. Porcelain is about making it; losing it; loving it; and hating it. Itrsquo;s about finding your people; your place; thinking youve lost them both; and then; somehow; when you think itrsquo;s over; from a place of well-earned despair; creating a masterpiece. As a portrait of the young artist; Porcelain is a masterpiece in its own right; fit for the short shelf of musiciansrsquo; memoirs that capture not just a scene but an age; and something timeless about the human condition. Push play.